How do you play your game?

I control one or two sims at a time, and if there are more sims in the household I let those sims do what they want. And sometimes I just start the game to pose certain sims or to take screenshots for a short story. :smile:

I am mostly hands-off but there are some things that I insist on like families eating together and getting to bed at a reasonable time. Because of the Set the Table and Call to Meal mod, getting my sims to eat together is easy since I only have to control the sim that serves the meal. I also like to grant my sim kids their waking wish (when possible) to ensure they go to school with as many good moodlets as possible. Toddlers, children and teens are directed more than the rest of the family but that is to ensure they get the necessary skills to age up well but even they are left to their own devices a lot of the time. I also use a mod that makes it more likely that a sim will autonomously skill a toddler but have found it only works when I send them to the park since there are too many distractions at home. I have had visiting ghosts wake up toddlers and teach them how to walk and talk :)

Of course I don't let my sims run feral all the time or they would never learn the skills which I think are important like cooking and gardening. I generally pick LTWs that can be achieved without much direction from me. For example, if I have a disciplined sim I will give them the LTW that requires them to master the MA and athletic skills or if I have a virtuoso sim I will give them the LTW that needs the guitar and charisma skills to be mastered.

As for romance, I will only direct my sims to try for baby at a time that suits me. No way will I have a baby coming at meal times or late at night or early in the morning. Apart from that they are responsible for their own romantic needs.

I do pause a lot but not to control them. I pause so I can track each member of the family to see what they are up to and to take pictures.

I always start out with one family but as these generations progress, I find myself wanting to control the actions of every descendant. I have to force myself to pick one child to carry on the legacy, otherwise I get nothing done switching from the houses of 5 adult siblings trying to force them to take the path I want them to!

I started out with one Sim named Caroline. She had a son named Carlton later who got married and had two kids. Caroline's husband died, she got remarried and had two late-in-life children. They've since married and starting having their own children. I've been bouncing around trying to control them all. I had to settle on one!

All of my sims would die on day one if I didn't take control. :tongue:

@Mikezumi OMG I didn't know this mod existed until now. I am going to download it right this very second. I have been trying to get my family to eat together there's always something and they line up to get their food, the 1st one is done eating by the time the last one gets their's. When I read your comment, I got really excited. Hope it works! Thank you!

I usually only play one household and not the entire town (although for blank worlds I do set up each household but once set up they're entirely on their own).

I do tend to control a lot of what my active household does but at times I give them free reign. If I have elders in the household I usually let them do whatever they want since they have most likely already accomplished everything I wanted them to. Children and teens I tend to control more.

Sometimes I will set up a household and just mainly control one sim and then let the others do what they want. This is mostly in households of single young adults. I have even tried setting up some as roommates to control them even less. I usually give them rabbit hole jobs that take no direct intervention.

If I am playing a game and writing a story about it I control a lot more to get the pictures and experiences I want for the story.

So how much I control my active household depends on what type of game I'm playing.

I mostly play my game on high free will, so nearly everything that happens in the game. Friendships, fights, romances, etc. usually happens because my sims wanted it to happen. I have micromanaged a few times, such as setting up certain scenes where I would need to turn free will off so that my sims don't wander off since I've noticed that they cannot sit down for more than 2 seconds on high free will. Of course, I do tend to play big families, so some order is needed. I usually only micromanage in the mornings when my sims need to get ready for work or school. Other than that, they pretty much do what they want for the most part. Although I'm not above cancelling some actions that I don't agree with.

I am pretty close to micro-managing. I'm kind of control freak.
I set the theme, I have general idea for every sim I play where I want him to be in the long run.
My usual saves runs with no sroty progression, I interfere a lot as far as the population, I decide about their careers, outfits, their aging, romantic interests (with little room for surprises), and they usually go for actions that will bring them lifetime rewards and/or actions that I think will be fun - I direct them. I also fast forward when they are asleep or at the rabbitholes.

In the past (in my first saves), I just made a bunch of sims in CAS, merged them into a premades household and just layed down to watch what they are up to, like "The Big Brother" (the reality show, not like a book term) :wink: It was also fun and curious, but now I have less time to just sit and watch, and I also enjoy the building and directing the story which requires a lot of intervention.

(sorry for my English I feel like some of my sentenses got wrong)

I control them but always leave room for autonomous behaviour and decisions. Often I go with that and then I’m in control again.

A couple years ago, I would have definitely been in the control everything category, and I still queue up actions for everyone in my household most every day, but I've learned to let them go part of the day or all day sometimes and just let them enjoy themselves and see what they get up to. I've found I have more fun that way, too. ;) I still don't usually play with story progression, so I'm controlling in that households I'm not playing (I rotate to some degree), are set up how I want them to be - for instance, who lives where, what jobs they have, etc.